In recent years, in order to improve an added value in the field of printing such as catalog printing, direct mail printing and so forth, there has been an increasing demand for high value-added prints having been subjected to a surface treatment such as a gloss treatment, for example. With respect to such a print, demanded have been those of which gloss of an entire or a part of the surface can be adjusted to a desired glossiness, and further demanded have been those of which gloss can be precisely controlled.
In Patent Document 1, as a technique to form a gloss surface uniformly on the entire surface, proposed has been a method to use, for example, a toner containing no colorant, which is called as a clear toner or a transparent toner. More concretely, proposed has been a method to form a gloss surface uniformly on the entire surface of a print, by providing a clear toner layer on an image formed via, for example, inkjet printing, followed by heating and then cooling.
However, in the method proposed in Patent Document 1, it has been difficult to form an image in which an arbitrary section is adjusted to an arbitrary glossiness, while an image of which glossiness of entire print surface is improved has been formed.
Patent Document 1: Japanese Patent Application Publication Open to Public Inspection (hereafter referred to as JP-A) No. 11-7174.